Oakland moves ahead with waterfront ballpark plan

With Jean Quan as mayor-elect, Oakland is moving forward with its ballpark plan, presenting the Victory Court site on the estuary near Jack London Square as its preferred option to Major League Baseball, according to East Bay Express.

Oakland’s renewed interest comes after Victory Court supporter Quan narrowly defeated Don Perata, who did not support a new ballpark and had $25,000 in backing from A’s owners Lew Wolff and John Fisher.

Oakland will pay for an environmental impact report on the ballpark, Quan said. San Jose has already finished such a study for its own downtown ballpark proposal.

It’s not clear whether Quan’s bid has any practical effect. Wolff made it clear in an Athletics Nation interview he doesn’t have any interest in building a new stadium anyplace except San Jose. MLB owners are meeting in Florida this week. Before anything gets done, they’ll have to decide the key issue of whether the imperial overlords poor, struggling Giants will retain territorial rights to San Jose.